DON'T REPUBLICANS THINK PERJURY IS A "HIGH CRIME"?

From AlterNet:

Court Unseals Potentially Devastating Testimony by Mitt Romney in Friend's Divorce Case

The case in question began more than 20 years ago, when Mitt Romney--then hedge funder at Bain Capital--testified in the divorce proceedings on behalf of Staples-CEO Tom Stemberg, at the time Romney’s close friend and business partner. The divorce hearings occurred shortly before Staples--which has become the GOP’s misleading poster child for Bain Capital’s financial track record--went public, earning Stemberg and Bain Capital millions. 

 

In the testimony, however, Romney allegedly lied about the future of the company, saying it was “overvalued” and that Stemberg was a “dreamer” for thinking the company could grow large. As a result, Maureen received very little in the divorce settlement--only to learn that her husband and his cohort Mitt Romney quickly turned around and cashed in their own stocks in Staples for a small fortune right after the divorce was finalized.

More here.

So the article's take on this is that it will embarrass Romney with women voters, you know, just another in what is now a seemingly continual list of dunderheaded misogynistic moves made by prominent Republicans over the last year or so.  But I'm seeing something that is potentially much more devastating.

Remember those heady final weeks of 1998?  Remember the booming economy?  Remember how the Republicans wanted to put it all at risk by impeaching President Clinton over oral sex with an intern?  Of course, the impeachment wasn't technically about the oral sex--rather, that's what all the hoopla was about.  No, the technical legal grounds for the impeachment were that the President lied under oath about the oral sex.  Never mind that he was under oath for questioning about the utterly unrelated non-scandal called "Whitewater."  Never mind that smiling snake and professional dickwad inquisitor Kenneth Starr clearly maneuvered the President into choosing either public embarrassment or marital stability.  Never mind that Starr did this for the very purpose of creating grounds for impeachment.  Consider, instead, the position uniting Republican mouths in lockstep for months: perjury is so gosh darned serious, in all instances, for all reasons, because the entire judicial system depends on absolute honesty from witnesses, which is why such an action must necessarily rise to the level of the "high crimes and misdemeanors" named in the US Constitution as warranting impeachment of a duly elected President.  This is what they said as they beat their chests in righteous indignation over and over and over.  This is about the integrity of the entire judicial system, they screamed, for weeks and weeks.  Bill Clinton destroyed the integrity of the entire judicial system because he lied about oral sex while being questioned about a totally unrelated matter that also happened to be a witch hunt.  Off with his head.

This was, and to the best of my knowledge continues to be, the official position of the Republican Party.  Any perjury at all is a "high crime" against the United States.  I mean, I disagree, of course.  The circumstances of the questioning, in the case of President Clinton, essentially shred that argument to pieces, but, you know, I'm not a Constitutional law expert.

But if it can be convincingly illustrated that Romney is guilty of perjury, the GOP must necessarily reject him.  By their own standard, he would be guilty of a "high crime," utterly invalidating him as worthy of the Oval Office.  Indeed, if elected, the House must necessarily move immediately to impeach him.  Or they're all big huge liars and scumbags.  Totally unworthy of holding elected office, themselves, at all.

Of course, assuming Romney did, in fact, perjure himself, I have absolutely no expectation that his party would hold him to the same standard.  Because they never really believed their own reasoning in the first place.  They impeached Clinton because they could.  Because they arrogantly believe that no Democrat is worthy of being President.  Because they believe that only they are the true Americans.  And lying, creating bullshit legal standards, witch hunt judicial fishing expeditions on the tax payers' dime, show trials in Congress, all of that's just fine when aimed at Democrats.  But certainly not when we're talking about the real Americans in the Republican Party.

It's business as usual.

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